Modern Diaspora Research Articles

Transnational is not diasporic: A Bourdieusian approach to the study of modern diaspora

Given the apparent similarities to transnational activities, diasporic activities, processes and actors are often the first victims of the conceptual curse of transnationalism, resulting in the glossing over of particularities in the diaspora field which, if studied separately, would have important analytical consequences for migration studies. Failure to introduce viable options for differentiating between two (very) different sets of activities that comprise transnational and diaspora activities, means we are unable to identify specificities that have important consequences for the analysis of the diaspora field. By introducing the concept of ‘field’, and arguing that the diaspora field should be separate from the transnational field, we demonstrate that the actions of diaspora groups towards their homeland, with particular emphasis on the case of the Lebanese diaspora, are best studied independently. The ‘field’ framework highlights the power relations that determine the impact of diaspora remittances and brings forward the centrality of the state in diaspora–homeland relationships.

ADAPTATION POTENTIAL OF ETHNIC DIASPORAS IN BORDER REGIONS OF RUSSIA

The article is devoted to the analysis of the features of migration processes in six border regions of Russia: the Altai Territory, the Amur Region, the Astrakhan Region, the Volgograd Region, the Republic of Tyva, and the Khabarovsk Region. Based on expert assessments, data on the state of the migration situation and the effects of migration in certain regions of the country was obtained, the main directions of adaptation and integration of migrants, the adaptation potential of modern diasporas, and regional specifics of migration processes were identified. The results of the study indicate the relevance of timely implementation of measures aimed at promoting social adaptation and integration of migrants into the host society. The practical significance of the study lies in the possibility of using the obtained data for effective management in the field of migration policy at the regional level.border regions.

ETHNIC DIASPORAS: ADAPTIVE AND INTEGRATIVE POTENTIAL IN CROSS-BORDER REGIONS OF RUSSIA

The social significance of scientific studies of ethnic communities is conditioned by the increase of diasporas becoming a common stationary phenomenon in most countries of the world. The scientific discourse of the problem is aimed at analyzing the integral and conflict-causing aspects of the activities of modern diasporas, which will be determined by the specificity of the historical, socio-economic situation, region of residence, features of interethnic policy, etc. The goal of the article was to analyze evaluations of representatives of diasporas in six regions of the Russian borderland about success of adaptation and integration of migrants in the host community. The set of indicators included attitudes towards migrant children in educational institutions, opinions about the restriction or stimulation of migration in the regions, attitudes towards illegal migrants, the problem of national enclaves. The presented results are based on a systems approach, the theory of interdependence in the world development, the essence of which is the formation of the transnational structure of the world community. Conclusions about the adaptive and integration potential of regional diasporas are made, differential assessments on a number of socially significant issues thatdetermine the scientific field of the phenomenon of transit migration in the border areas of the Russian Federation under study are presented. The scientific novelty of the proposed results consists in the study of the role of ethnic communities, in comparison with the local population of the recipient countries, which can be used in forecasting the effectiveness of integration processes and providing the scientific basis for regulating the risk of interethnic conflicts. The practical significance consists in the possibility of optimizing the activities of diasporas for effective social management in the field of migration policy.

Carol Zemel, Looking Jewish: Visual Culture and Modern Diaspora

Carol Zemel, <i>Looking Jewish: Visual Culture and Modern Diaspora</i>

К вопросу об определении феномена диаспоры (на примере армянской диаспоры Российской Федерации)

The article examines the role of the diaspora in the political processes of the state. As an example, the Armenian Diaspora is located on the territory of the Russian Federation. The main approaches to determining the phenomenon of «diaspora» by well-known domestic and foreign scientists are considered. Key characteristics of classical and modern diasporas, as well as modern approaches to the phenomenon of «diaspora»: sociological, political and ethnic, are presented. The author analyzes the reasons for the resettlement of Armenians from their historical homeland. The main periods of formation of the Armenian diaspora in Russia are outlined. The author defines the stages of formation and development of the Armenian diaspora in Russia. The role of the Armenian Diaspora at the present stage is highlighted. The research reveals the main directions and tasks of the Armenian Diaspora. The role of the Diocese of the Armenian Apostolic Church in the life of the Armenian Diaspora in the Russian Federation is noted.

A Case Study Of How An Irish Island School Contributes To Community Sustainability, Viability And Vitality

Island studies have rarely focused on the role of small schools on offshore islands. Island schools are often impacted by the decisions of national, regional and local educational authorities, particularly in today’s world where diseconomic and disbenefit arguments highlight the non-viability of small schools. Such schools are seen as unable to provide an adequate curriculum, socially disadvantageous and generally inefficient. This raises an important question: How does a small island school promote the participation and engagement of families and the community? This paper reports a bounded case to illustrate the characteristics intrinsic to a single small rural school as a communal hub on one of Ireland’s Atlantic islands. A narrative about the school in past and present times, along with vulnerability mapping, is used to explore the social dynamics of the island school within its community. The findings show how the modern diaspora is different from that of earlier generations. The case also illustrates the differences in vulnerabilities between a perceived attractive environment, supported by a viable school potentially driving in-migration, and communities where the absence of a primary school or the risk of its closure would diminish the attractiveness of an island as a place for young families.

Rooted-transnationalism and the representational function of food in Hiromi Goto’s Chorus of Mushrooms

ABSTRACTThis paper uses a close reading combined with Koichi Iwabuchi’s nascent concept rooted-transnationalism to illustrate the representational function of food in Hiromi Goto’s Chorus of Mushrooms. By examining the representational function of food, we can understand how Goto chooses to arbitrate the belonging of the Canadian Nikkei characters in her novel. The three generations in the matrilineal Tonkatsu family begin the novel with varying (almost stereotyped) cultural identities, but by understanding how their identity is represented through food as the novel progresses we can see these identities worked into a nuanced dialogue with the modern diaspora condition. We learn that explanations of diaspora identity in literature using transnationalism as a framework can be enhanced by considering cultural identity in terms of its rootedness, particularly how it interacts with sociocultural factors at varying spatial levels. Understanding the representational function of food in a rooted-transnational context shows how food problematises the belonging of Nikkei yet can also provide emancipation from the challenge of diasporic cultural identity. Through this analysis of Goto’s novel, we can gain a deeper appreciation of the complexity of modern Nikkei diaspora cultural identities.

Distant Homes: Migrant Sensibilities and the Problems of Acculturation

Continued waves of diasporic movement over successive historical moments in South Asia make it difficult to homogenise all diaspora into one mould. The present paper explores the conflict between the process of acculturation and the longing for homeland experienced by three South Asian poets who belong to a specific period in modern diaspora. Contemporaries all, Agha Shahid Ali (1949-2001), Meena Alexander (1951-) and Imtiaz Dharker (1954-) express in their poetry their (c)overt sense of longing and attachment to the homeland even as they negotiate the different interstitial spaces they occupy. Their reinvention of their identity in the process of acculturation and their expanding political concerns lead them to look beyond the nation as home and develop a form of cosmopolitanism. Does this cosmopolitanism give them an assurance, a sense of belonging or an uneasy discomfort? I intend to discuss some of these issues as expressed in their poetry.

Book Review

Book Review

Диаспора в системе международных отношений в современном мире (на примере армянской диаспоры)

The article examines the diaspora in the system of international relations in the modern world on the example of the Armenian diaspora. The basic conceptual approaches to the definition of the term «diaspora» by well-known domestic and foreign scientists are explored. The key characteristics of classical and modern diasporas are given. The author of the article analyzes the reasons for the resettlement of Armenians from their historical homeland. The main periods of migration of the Armenian people are outlined. The author defines the stages of formation and development of the institutions of ties between Armenia and the Diaspora. The role of the Armenian Diaspora in lobbying the interests of Armenia in the countries of residence (residence/citizenship) is underlined. The research reveals the main directions and tasks of the development of partnership relations between Armenia and the Diaspora. The role of the Diocese of the Armenian Apostolic Church in the life of the Armenian diaspora in the countries of residence (residence/citizenship) is noted.

The Open Door. Early Modern Wajorese Statecraft and Diaspora, written by Kathryn Anderson Wellen

The Open Door. Early Modern Wajorese Statecraft and Diaspora, written by Kathryn Anderson Wellen

Book review: Looking Jewish: Visual Culture and Modern Diaspora, Carol Zemel

Book review: Looking Jewish: Visual Culture and Modern Diaspora, Carol Zemel

근대 디아스포라에 대한 기억과 재현의 윤리 : 주요섭의 《구름을 잡으려고》를 중심으로

근대 디아스포라에 대한 기억과 재현의 윤리 : 주요섭의 《구름을 잡으려고》를 중심으로

Looking Jewish: Visual Culture &amp; Modern Diaspora, written by Carol Zemel

Looking Jewish: Visual Culture &amp; Modern Diaspora, written by Carol Zemel

The Open Door: Early Modern Wajorese Statecraft and Diaspora by Kathryn Anderson Wellen

Reviewed by: The Open Door: Early Modern Wajorese Statecraft and Diaspora by Kathryn Anderson Wellen Lance Nolde The Open Door: Early Modern Wajorese Statecraft and Diaspora. By kathryn anderson wellen. De Kalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 2014. 220 pp. $35.00 (paper). Joseph Conrad, in his 1920 novel The Rescue, wrote of the frequent travels and commercial acumen of the Wajorese people. The Wajorese, part of the larger Bugis ethnic group of Sulawesi, Indonesia, were well known in Conrad’s time as itinerant traders who established a successful network of merchant and migrant communities across maritime South-east Asia. Thus, according to Conrad, it was “a common saying amongst the Malay race that to be a successful traveler and trader a man must have some Wajo blood in his veins.”17 In The Open Door: Early Modern Wajorese Statecraft and Diaspora, Kathryn Anderson Wellen, a researcher at the Royal Institute of Southeast Asian and Caribbean Studies (KITLV) in Leiden, The Netherlands, takes as her subject the Wajorese diaspora in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and explores various facets of Wajorese migration, commerce, kinship, identity, and sociopolitical organization in rich detail. The result of Wellen’s work is a welcome contribution to our understanding of the history of this important Indonesian community and to the broader study of diaspora in world historical context. Despite their relative notoriety, little has been written on the history of the Wajorese people. The difficulty of primary sources, both the indigenous manuscripts written in the Bugis language and script, known as lontaraq, and the records of the Dutch East India Company (VOC), has limited the historical study of the Wajorese and South Sulawesi’s other major ethnic communities, namely the Bugis and Makassarese peoples, [End Page 183] to a small group of scholars with the necessary language facility. Most of those studies, furthermore, are narrow in scope and directed primarily at specialists of Indonesian and Southeast Asian history. Utilizing a combination of European archival records and lontaraq manuscripts, both published and unpublished, and making judicious use of the excellent work of Dutch and Indonesian scholars, as well as more recent ethnographic research, Wellen reconstructs an important period of the Wajorese past and brings their fascinating history into conversation with nonspecialists interested in the study of diasporic communities. The Open Door is structured with this broad readership in mind. The core chapters are organized thematically so that readers with specific interests in political organization (chap. 3), commerce (chap. 4), family relations (chap. 5), or identity and ethnicization (chap. 6) in diasporic contexts can easily find material that is useful for comparative study. These chapters are bookended by an introduction that situates the study in the larger conversation of diaspora and state formation in Southeast Asian and world history, a brief historical overview of Wajorese migration (chap. 2), a chapter covering the historical journey of the Wajorese leader La Madukelleng (chap. 7), who exemplifies the strong links between diaspora and homeland, and a succinct conclusion that places the Wajorese diaspora in comparative perspective. At the heart of the book is Wellen’s argument that many of the socio-political processes influencing Wajorese lives in the homeland functioned similarly in diaspora, and thus the Wajorese diaspora serves as a unique and interesting case study in which “the division between state and diaspora is blurred” (p. 14). Indeed, the right of Wajorese people to freely come and go to and from their homeland is enshrined in Wajorese oral and written traditions, which use the common metaphor of the open door: “The door of Wajoq shall be open when they enter; the door of Wajoq shall be open when they leave” (p. 4). As Wellen demonstrates in each chapter, this encouragement of overseas migration and commerce by Wajorese leaders in the homeland combined with a number of long-standing cultural attributes to create a synergistic relationship between diaspora and homeland, a situation quite unlike other early modern diasporas such as the Armenians or Jews. This unique synergy is most apparent in chapter 7, which examines the attempt by the exiled Wajorese leader La Maddukelleng to unite the people of South Sulawesi and expel the Dutch from their stronghold in Makassar, which...

The Modern Russian-Speaking Communities in the World: Formation, Assimilation and Adaptation in Host Societies

Modern Diasporas are not just historically dispersed peoples, united by common ethno-cultural roots, maintaining real or imaginary ties with their historic homelands. Modern Diasporas should be viewed as strategically vital trans-national networks with remarkable social, political and economic potential. The Russian Diaspora of today has formed in unique historical circumstances, as the consequence of the break-up of the Soviet Union, the formation of new nation-states in its place, and a massive wave of emigration from this area since the early 1990s. This paper will examine the global nature of the contemporary Russian Diaspora, both in the West and in the Far East. Focusing on the example of the USA, Finland, Cyprus, Japan and Korea, it will examine the statistical size of this Diaspora, its ambiguous ethno-cultural composition, its patterns of integration and assimilation, its forms of diasporic self-organization and support, and, finally, the creation of Diaspora-based business, professional, socio-cultural and educational networks. Furthermore, this paper will look at how these diasporic groups represent the Russian Federation abroad and the role that they increasingly play in Russian diplomacy and foreign policy. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2015.v6n3s4p155

Before and After 1983: The Impact of Theorising Sri Lankan Tamil Migration History around the 1983 Colombo Riots

This paper discusses the material effects of the theorisation of the contemporary Sri Lankan Tamil diaspora around the 1983 Colombo riots. In the complicated aftermath of the end of the Sri Lankan civil war in 2009, it is necessary to rethink the way in which diasporic history has been constructed in order to factor in its multiple dimensions and underlying dynamics. By critically foregrounding the key literature on the Sri Lankan Tamil diaspora, which is definitive to understanding the history of Sri Lankan Tamil emigration around the 1983 riots, the modern diaspora can be framed anew by longer and more diverse historical perspectives.

Chinese Migration and Settlement in Southeast Asia Before 1850: Making Fields From the Sea

AbstractHuman migration is a central theme in world and Asian history, but important cases, among them Chinese who emigrated to other countries between ca. 1000 and 1850 CE, have been somewhat neglected in the migration literature. Since the mid‐19th century, millions of Chinese migrated temporarily or permanently to other countries, making these migrants and their descendants a vital presence in the world economy and in the population of many nations. Today, more than 30 million people of Chinese ancestry or ethnicity live outside of Greater China, over 20 million of them in Southeast Asia. But this emigration has a much longer history, the subject of recent scholarly interest that has enriched our knowledge and is the focus of this essay. It has been said of the maritime trading and fishing peoples of southern China that they made fields from the sea. Enterprising and adaptable, Chinese have long sailed to Southeast Asia to trade, many of them settling permanently. By 1400, Chinese trade networks linked Southeast Asian trading ports to China and to each other. Chinese settlers eventually became dominant in the commercial sector in many societies, including most Western colonies, in Southeast Asia. Increasing numbers of migrants arrived to trade or mine for tin and gold, ushering in a “Chinese century” in the Southeast Asian economies from around 1700 into the mid‐1800s. Over the centuries some Chinese married local women, serving as cultural brokers between China and Southeast Asia and fostering hybrid communities. Others maintained their cultural heritage. After 1850, millions more left China. Chinese immigrants and their descendants built the foundations for a widespread modern diaspora and transnational connections. The emigrant flow from China continues, continuing a human behavior – migration – that has a long history in Asia.

Transcontinental Modernism: How to Find the Shortcut

More than ever, it is urgent to expand the new emerging consciousness focused on the need to include other territories in our efforts to achieve a comprehensive understanding of the “Modern Diaspora.” Recently, the development of concepts such as ‘hybrid’ or the ‘otherness’ has been promoting a nuanced historical analysis on architecture and politics in the 20th century beyond a Eurocentric vision. The recognition that a widespread awareness of the Modern Movement architecture has always been serving colonization involves rethinking the basic principle of Modern welfare society and practiced architecture as a mission: how Modern principles have been exchanged, resulting from a Eurocentric culture with the cultures of East and Africa.

“An Essential Expression of the People”: Interpretations of Hasidic Song in the Composition and Performance History of Ernest Bloch's Baal Shem

Abstract This article examines Ernest Bloch's Baal Shem: Three Pictures of Chassidic Life, considering its score, its performance history, and early recordings of the second movement, “Nigun,” by Yehudi Menuhin, Joseph Szigeti, and Mischa Elman, to investigate the idea, promoted by the composer and many of his performers and critics, that the music represented Jewish identity through the evocation of Hasidic song. Bloch's score and Menuhin's performances were described as expressing what was often characterized during the early twentieth century as a self-affirming racial feeling that linked the modern diaspora in America to Eastern European Hasidic Jewish communities. With Baal Shem, Bloch and his performers and listeners participated in a self-conscious effort to construct a modern Jewish identity that they believed could be conveyed in the sounds and structures of art music. Menuhin's lifelong friendship and collaboration with Bloch underscores the crucial roles of Bloch's performers in working with the composer to devise compositional and performance tropes for the representation of Hasidic song, and in creating his broad reputation as a composer of a definitive Jewish music, a reputation Bloch would sometimes embrace and at other times disavow.